One Piece : Brotherhood Chapter 436

The final severed head was tossed into the tar-black lake with a sickening splash, sending ripples slithering outward like silent screams across the still, putrid surface. The air was thick with the stench of death—decaying flesh, the acrid tang of blood, and the lingering charred stench of bodies burned alive. The battlefield was now silent, save for the faint, wet squelch of flesh shifting as corpses slowly sank into the obsidian depths of the lake.

Among the bodies, so were still twitching, their last vestiges of life refusing to fade just yet. A severed hand, fingers still curling in vain, bobbed in the thick, black liquid before sinking beneath the surface, devoured by sothing unseen.

Izumi stood amidst the carnage, her scarlet gaze cold and unreadable. With a sharp flick of her wrist, she sent an arc of dark crimson splattering onto the blood-soaked ground. Her katana, gleaming under the moonlight, reflected the bodies littered around her feet—like broken dolls, their lifeless eyes forever frozen in terror.

With practiced ease, she ran the blade against the rim of her scabbard, ensuring that no trace of filth remained before sliding it back into its sheath. The soft click echoed like a death knell in the heavy silence.

Unlike Dorian, who stood grinning, his entire body drenched in gore, Izumi felt no pleasure in the slaughter. Not disgust either. Simply... nothing. She had long since stopped feeling anything when it ca to killing. Yet, if there was anything that did unsettle her, it was him, Xebec.

Dorian, now wiping his blood-soaked face with his equally bloodied palm, only succeeding in saring the viscera further. His wild eyes glead with exhilaration, like a beast that had just gorged itself on a fresh kill. He exhaled, running his tongue over his lips as he turned toward their leader.

"So..." he mused, tilting his head, deliberately dragging his boot over a barely-breathing pirate’s throat, crushing the windpipe beneath his heel. "Is this gonna be enough to bring that crazy bitch back?"

The corpse beneath him let out a faint, wet gasp—a dying breath that never finished. Xebec did not imdiately answer. Instead, he lifted one dripping hand from the black lake, his fingers coated in a thick, tar-like substance that oozed from his skin in slow, heavy droplets. The darkness clung to him, almost... alive.

Dorian’s smirk widened, but there was sothing uneasy in his tone as he added, "You know... if you can just bring people back from the dead, what’s even the point of all this? Hell, who could ever stop you if you could just keep resurrecting anyone you want?"

Xebec finally turned his head, his sharp, piercing gaze locking onto Dorian’s with sothing almost... amused.

"You sound concerned," he said, his voice low, edged with mockery.

Dorian’s smirk faltered just slightly. Izumi remained silent, but her hand rested lightly on the hilt of her blade, betraying the slightest tension. They were both ambitious. And Xebec knew they did not follow him out of loyalty or gratitude. No, the only thing binding them to him was a far crueler truth—they were his, whether they liked it or not.

His creations. His playthings. Xebec’s smirk deepened.

"If you’re looking for a way to break free of my control," he murmured, almost bored, "you might as well forget it."

Then, he lifted his black-stained hand, letting the thick liquid drip slowly onto the corpse-ridden ground.

"Because if I die..." He curled his fingers slowly, deliberately. "Then so do you." A thick silence followed.

Dorian’s grin was still there—but his fingers twitched. A small, almost imperceptible motion. Izumi’s sharp gaze narrowed, her mind undoubtedly calculating. They were testing him.

Perhaps they thought, for even a mont, that this was the perfect ti to strike him down. To rid themselves of his leash before he beca sothing even they could not fathom. But Xebec was always two steps ahead. He let out a soft chuckle.

"Don’t even think about it."

Izumi’s grip loosened, ever so slightly—her mind made up. No. This was not the ti.

Dorian, on the other hand, looked less amused now. His smirk had lost its edge, his expression unreadable.

"Tch..." he muttered, looking away. Xebec, satisfied, finally turned his attention back to the lake.

Without another word, he plunged his arm into the abyss once more, his fingers disappearing beneath the unnatural surface. Dorian’s expression darkened.

"So then..." he sneered, crossing his arms. "If we’re so damn bound to you, why let that bitch Scarlett walk away?" Xebec did not pause his movents, but his smirk widened.

"Because," he said smoothly, "unlike you morons, she was still alive." Dorian frowned. Xebec let his fingers stir the black liquid, watching the ripples spread outward like shackles pulling sothing from the deep.

"I didn’t grant her life," he continued, voice laced with mockery. "I simply... gave her back her youth and vitality. And in return..."

He lifted his hand from the lake, the darkness clinging to his fingers unnaturally, as if sothing unseen was resisting its departure.

"She found a replacent."

Dorian’s expression twisted, his mind already racing through the implications. Izumi’s gaze shifted, looking past Xebec—toward the altar at the lake’s center. And there, upon the stone slab, lay the corpse of a monster. The corpse of Charlotte Linlin.

Unlike the titanic presence she had once been, her remains were now withered, skeletal—her once-mighty fra reduced to skin and bones, her flesh shrunken as if sothing had already begun devouring her soul. The putrid stench of death and decay clung thick in the air, but... sothing was wrong.

Her body should have rotted away completely. Yet, it remained. Preserved. As if even death refused to claim her. Xebec’s eyes glead with dark amusent as he stepped toward the altar.

"This..." he murmured, almost reverently, "is what I’ve been waiting for."

The air suddenly shifted—the temperature dropping so drastically that even Dorian, despite his body being covered in oil, shivered involuntarily. A low, unnatural sound rumbled from the depths of the lake, like sothing ancient... waking up.

Izumi’s hand instinctively tightened around her katana. Dorian’s smirk vanished completely.

And then— A single gust of wind blew through the surroundings. And Charlotte Linlin’s corpse... twitched as black tendrils crawled onto the altar from within the lake, dragging the corpse into the lake.

A grotesque, snapping sound echoed as her jaw shifted slightly, as if... attempting to speak. Xebec grinned, stretching his fingers, pulling sothing unseen from the depths of the abyss. It was beginning. Death... was no longer an escape.

Dorian watched the process unfold with a twisted fascination, his golden eyes gleaming with unrestrained curiosity. Unlike Izumi, who stood stoic and unmoved, Dorian relished every grotesque second.

The altar upon which Charlotte Linlin’s decayed corpse rested had begun to sink, the black tar-like lake swallowing it whole, dragging the rotting remains into its depths like the greedy maw of a beast. Izumi’s sharp gaze flickered toward Xebec, watching him with silent calculation.

With each passing second, as Xebec channeled his power, a noticeable change overca him—his skin paled, his breathing grew slightly uneven, and a thin sheen of sweat ford upon his forehead. For the first ti, Izumi began to truly understand the cost of Xebec’s ability.

Despite the absolute horror of what he could do, it was clear this technique placed an enormous burden on his body. She had long wondered why Xebec had not simply resurrected every great warrior who had ever fallen at sea. After all, there were hundreds of thousands of corpses beneath their feet—Hachinosu was built upon the bones of the dead.

And yet, despite the endless supply of corpses, Xebec had chosen only a select few to bring back. There had to be conditions. Rules. Limitations. Perhaps, she now realized, this was the reason he had let Scarlett walk away instead of killing and resurrecting her as his puppet.

The power to bind the dead was not absolute.

And yet... what truly unsettled Izumi was not the process of resurrection itself—but the implications of her own existence. She and Dorian had been brought back by Xebec, but not simply as hollow husks or mindless slaves.

No. They had retained everything. Their minds. Their personalities. And most terrifying of all—their Devil Fruit abilities. By all logic, the mont they had died, their Devil Fruits should have reincarnated into the world, waiting to be consud by another.

But sohow... Xebec had bound not only their souls and bodies, but their very powers as well.

Izumi had tested this herself—her blade still cut as sharply as it had in life. Dorian, that mad dog, was still an oil-based Logia, capable of turning his body into living tar.

It defied the natural laws of Devil Fruits. And if Xebec could do this with them, then... Izumi’s hand instinctively rested upon the hilt of her katana. Just how deep did his power run?

And just how far did his ambitions stretch?

Xebec, oblivious to their thoughts, remained fully focused on his task. His fingers sank deeper into the lake’s abyss, his grip tightening as if physically grasping sothing unseen beneath the surface. His heart pounded in his chest. This was it. The mont he had waited for—planned for—bled for.

This was only the beginning. Linlin would be the first, but not the last. Shiki. Whitebeard. Kaido.

Every single one of those traitorous bastards who had abandoned him at God Valley—he would drag them all back from the depths and make them his eternal puppets. His vision blurred for a mont. The strain was imnse.

Even for him, this resurrection was unlike any before. Linlin was a beast among monsters, her very existence having shaken the seas for decades. To bind her soul back to her corpse... to force her consciousness into servitude... was like trying to shackle a hurricane.

But he was Rocks D. Xebec. He would not fail. Then, as if in response to his will, the lake began to stir. The thick tar-like substance started to bubble, releasing foul-slling vapors that twisted into the air like wailing spirits.

Dorian took a step back, his cocky grin faltering for the first ti. Even he could feel it now—sothing unnatural was coming. Izumi narrowed her eyes.

Then— The moonlight vanished. Without warning, the entire island of Hachinosu was plunged into darkness, as if the very skies rejected what was about to happen. A low, guttural rumble erupted from beneath the lake, like the growl of sothing ancient... awakening.

The tar began to rise, tendrils of black liquid slithering upward, twisting and writhing like hungry serpents.Then, from the depths, a grotesque hand erged. It was decayed, its skin shriveled and pale, its nails jagged and cracked. The flesh looked partially lted, the remnants of a long-rotted corpse, yet sothing about it was wrong.

The fingers twitched. Moved. Then, with a sudden burst, the entire torso of Charlotte Linlin surged upward, her corpse ripping free from the lake’s grasp. Her once-mighty body was now gaunt, her enormous fra shrunken, yet her presence was still monstrous. Her skull-like face was twisted in a grotesque grimace, her eyes hollow pits of darkness, void of any humanity.

Then—

Her mouth snapped open, and a bloodcurdling, soul-wrenching shriek tore through the air.

The very ground trembled. The bodies of the fallen twitched violently, as if sothing unnatural had brushed against their lingering souls.

Izumi held her ground, but her fingers twitched against her blade. Dorian took a slow breath, his smirk returning—but his eyes betrayed unease.

Xebec, however, grinned. "That’s it," he murmured, his voice dripping with dark satisfaction.

"Welco back, Little Linlin."

Linlin’s hollow, soulless eyes locked onto Xebec, and for a fleeting mont, it seed as though she didn’t recognize him. Then—her body convulsed violently, her massive fra twitching as if sothing unseen was binding her movents.

A sound bubbled up from her throat—what began as a guttural scream of agony soon twisted into a deep, deranged laughter, a laughter soaked in madness. Then, the lake itself began to churn violently, the black tar-like substance rippling outward like an ocean in the midst of a storm.

And then—the corpses began to vanish.

One by one, the hundreds of thousands of bodies floating in the lake were drawn into her like moths to a fla. Their decayed flesh liquefied, their bones cracked and dissolved, their very essence consud by the resurrected demon that was Charlotte Linlin.

Her flesh and bone nded before their very eyes—but what erged was not the grotesque, hulking crone they had known in her final days. No—this was the Linlin of her youth. Her towering form had shed its forr bulk, her limbs lean yet brimming with coiled strength. A twisted rebirth, yet the changes did not stop there.

Her entire body was cloaked in the pitch-black tar, the residual remains of the abyss she had been dragged from. It clung to her like a shroud, shifting and twisting as if alive. Then—her gaze snapped back to Xebec.

Her steps were slow, deliberate, yet there was a murderous certainty in the way she moved across the surface of the lake, each step sending ripples through the abyss. And Xebec—he frowned. Sothing was wrong. He could feel it. The control his Devil Fruit usually imposed upon the resurrected was weak. Far weaker than when he had revived Izumi and Dorian. And that was the mont Xebec understood—Linlin was different.

"Mamamama..."

The sound of her laughter was like glass shards scraping against steel, yet layered beneath it was sothing else—a chilling realization.

"Tell ... I’m dreaming." Her voice was low, trembling with sothing between rage and disbelief. "Tell ... this is HELL!"

Then, before she had even fully grasped her situation, her body lurched forward, her fist swinging with monstrous force, aiming directly for Xebec’s skull. Even if this was a nightmare, she wanted nothing more than to crush him. A thunderous boom split the air.

The sheer force of the impact sent shockwaves across the entire island, the ground beneath them splintering as though an earthquake had struck Hachinosu itself. Even Xebec—despite his legendary strength—was forced back, his feet dragging across the ground. Smoke and debris kicked up in his wake.

He had caught her punch with a single hand—but he could feel the strain in his bones. For the first ti in decades, Xebec had been forced to take a step back. His frown deepened. The process had drained him. And now, he was dealing with sothing he hadn’t accounted for.

Linlin wasn’t just resisting—she was fighting back with all her might, her strength so overwhelming that it felt as though her very existence rejected his control.

"Tch...!" Xebec clicked his tongue in annoyance. Then, with a re thought, his Devil Fruit power surged. The unseen chains of his ability lashed out once more, attempting to bind Linlin’s raging form.

But—

She didn’t stop. Her fists ca swinging wildly, each strike carrying the force of a natural disaster, her rage consuming her like an unrelenting inferno. Her voice was raw with fury.

"I’M GONNA KILL YOU, BASTARD!"

Xebec countered her every move, their blows shaking the very foundations of Hachinosu. And then, his patience snapped. His haki exploded outward. A black wave of sheer pressure rippled through the battlefield, the air itself cracking beneath its weight.

The mont it touched Linlin—her body froze. Not by her own will. It was as if sothing invisible had gripped her—an unseen force binding her like iron chains, halting her movents completely. Linlin’s teeth gritted, her body trembling with resistance.

"XEBEC...!" Her voice shook with fury.

"WHAT DID YOU DO TO ?! LET GO—LET KILL YOU!"

Her rage was palpable, but even as she struggled, it was clear that Xebec’s binding power had taken hold. Her fingers twitched. Her muscles tensed. But she could not break free. Then—she called out.

"Hera! Protheus! Zeus! Napoleon!"

But nothing answered. For the first ti in her existence, the very souls she had wielded as weapons were silent. A flicker of doubt crossed Linlin’s eyes—just for a mont. And Xebec saw it. Yet his own frown deepened. Sothing was definitely wrong.

She should not have been able to resist this much. Was it... her Devil Fruit? The Soru Soru no Mi—the ability to control and interact with souls—was one of the rarest and most feared Devil Fruits in existence.

Could it be... that her soul was fighting back? Could that explain why she wasn’t fully under his control? Doubt crept into his mind. For the first ti, he wondered—had he underestimated his own limits? Had he brought back sothing... that he could not fully control?

Behind him, Izumi and Dorian had remained silent, their eyes locked onto the chaotic battle before them. Dorian, who had up until now been smirking and entertained, found his expression faltering. Izumi’s grip on her katana tightened.

Because they saw it now. Xebec, for all his boasts of control, for all his claims of godhood—

Was struggling. Linlin’s resistance was profound—not just physically, but in so deeper way. A way that made them both realize a terrifying truth. The power that bound them to Xebec was not absolute. It could be resisted. Perhaps even... broken.

For the first ti, a seed of possibility was planted within their minds. And as Linlin’s furious, untad roars shook the very air, they both knew—this was not sealed as they had believed it to be.

"Xebec... what have you done to ?"

Linlin’s voice was hoarse, her breath coming in ragged gasps as she clutched her massive chest, her fingers trembling against her own flesh. A sudden, unbearable pressure seized her heart, as though an invisible hand was wrapped around it, squeezing tighter with every second.

Her body convulsed violently, her knees slamming into the earth beneath her. A deep, guttural scream tore from her throat—raw with agony, yet still burning with fury. Because she was Charlotte Linlin—Big Mom—a monster of the seas, a terror even among the Emperors of the New World.

Yet now—she was being brought to her knees like an animal. Every ti her mind drifted toward rebellion, every ti her instincts scread to tear Xebec apart, a searing pain jolted through her very soul, as if her very existence was rejecting the thought.

Xebec rely watched. His frown softened, replaced by sothing far more sinister—a slow, wicked grin, curling at the edges with the delight of a man who had just tad a wild beast.

Then, he laughed. It was not the laughter of joy, nor the roar of triumph—it was mockery, drenched in amusent and utter disdain.

"Tch... never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that the mighty Charlotte Linlin—the woman I raised, the woman who once terrorized the seas—would end up like this," Xebec sneered, his golden eyes glinting with sadistic pleasure.

"And at the hands of a brat who is still wet behind the ears?!" He scoffed, shaking his head in sheer disbelief. Linlin’s jaw clenched. Her rage did not wane. Her hatred did not fade. But no matter how much she fought against it, the curse of resurrection bound her like chains forged in the depths of hell itself.

Xebec took a casual step forward, the ground beneath his boots cracking slightly from the sheer weight of his presence.

"You do realize that struggling only makes you suffer more, don’t you?" His voice was silken, laced with mockery, yet brimming with an underlying authority that made the air itself feel heavy.

Linlin snarled, her teeth grinding as her hands dug into the scorched earth, her nails carving deep trenches into the very island itself. The raw force of her fury was enough to send shockwaves through the ground, her sheer brute strength threatening to tear the land apart.

Yet—she could do nothing. Not while her soul remained bound. Not while this monstrous man stood before her, holding the very essence of her existence in his grasp. She was trapped. And Xebec knew it. He leaned in slightly, his grin widening as he watched her struggle, savoring every mont of her desperation.

"Cease your hostility, Linlin...!" he mused, tilting his head slightly, as if offering her a rcy that did not exist.

"Who knows? Maybe if you accept your new place—if you kneel like the obedient mutt you are—" he chuckled, "—you might just spare yourself from the pain."

His voice was like oil on fire, igniting the rage within Linlin once more. But the more she fought—the more she resisted—the stronger the agony beca. And Xebec simply watched her break. Because this was the price of resurrection. And Linlin... was now just another pawn in his ga.